Brad Spurgeon's Blog

A world of music, auto racing, travel, literature, chess, wining, dining and other crazy thoughts….

The Political World of Jean-Hugues Oppel: Another In-Depth Interview With a French Crime Writer, this Time Talking at Semana Negra

January 23, 2021
bradspurgeon

Jean-Hugues Oppel

Jean-Hugues Oppel

I am absolutely delighted to have found this interview I did with Jean-Hugues Oppel in 1997 at the Semana Negra mystery festival in Gijon, Spain, and to be able to post it on this site in my collection of interviews and articles I did in the 1990s and early 2000s about the French crime novel. This interview is definitely one of the best and widest ranging of them all. I think the environment of the crazy festival helped for it to be so much fun, and so deep. But ultimately, as you will see, it is the depth of Jean-Hugues Oppel’s own knowledge and approach to life and writing that makes the difference here in this interview.

Another Interview from the past: François Guérif of Rivages and his World of Claude Chabrol and Barry Gifford and James Ellroy!

January 5, 2021
bradspurgeon

Rivages Cover of James Ellroy

Rivages Cover of James Ellroy

PARIS – Rereading this interview that I did 25 years ago with François Guérif, the director of the crime writing collection at the Rivages publishing house in Paris I am actually astounded by all of the interesting aspects to the link between the French publishing world and the American one. François Guérif had already been directing the collection at Rivages for 10 years, and he only left the job in 2017, so this interview is still in its own way relevant. But among the stories that makes this worth reading today are those linked to Guérif’s discovery of James Ellroy, to his hand in helping revive several careers of American writers, like Barry Gifford, and his work with Claude Chabrol, the film director. So as part of my decision to put up on this blog and publish for the first time ever these interviews in their entirety that were done as research for my article on French crime writing in the 1990s, here is my interview with François Guérif, then of Rivages, and certainly one of the most interesting of the Q&As so far!

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